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Iron adits of the village Hlyboke

More than a year we’ve been going to visit the village Hlyboke (outdated version: Malyy Holmets, Hutka) of Uzhhorod region. Two gorgeous sights of Uzhhorod area are situated in this village, more on its outskirts, and one of them is only gaining popularity. The first one is an extensive system of iron adits where ore was actively mined for the processing plant in the village Antalovtsi (outdated version Antolocz) in the thirties of last century.

A few hills of 34 square meters (according to the map of Uzhhorod forestry) are "littered" with adits. The second attraction is the cave "Lylyki" (ua: Lylyky). The length of passages is a few hundred meters. The area - 1 ha. It is high humidity in the cave. It is the unique zoological memorial of nature, protected by law. It is a place where such rare species of bats entered in the Red Book as: the large "horseshoe" (Rhinolophus ferrumequinum), the little "horseshoe" (Rhinolophus hipposideros) , the long-eared bat or Bechstein (Myotis bechsteini), the bat Natterer (Myotis nattereri), the wide-eared dat, European (Barbastella barbastellus) nested (and possibly now nest in some branches of ventilation, although everyone who we’ve communicated with, refutes this information) . The third, not yet famous, tourist attraction is a spring on the edge of forest behind the villas. Apparently, it represents a certain value to the church community, the monks of which have already appeared several times near the spring, drawing water into containers and asking locals whether there have not been any villas for sale near the spring. After questioning, they admitted that the community had a very strong desire to build a monastery near the spring.

To carry on the final decision of visiting Hlyboke was hampered with the absence of even approximate information on where to find all the above described attractions. I was chatting with friends from the village and they did not give me even the slightest information where that was. I visited friends of Uzhhorod forestry and we with several foresters – practitioners were skimming old map-cases comparing with satellite photos of explication areas (due to the service of Google.Maps) for several hours. All sights were on the maps, but unfortunately, there was no reference to the actual coordinates, only "squares" and "marks".

Neither colleagues-historians nor tourist savvy friends could help. Everyone just poked around in completely different places of maps around the village and made recommendations, use of which has been difficult. When it takes such a turn you have to act unceremoniously. We just got in the car, came into the village, stood in the center of the street and began to ask passers-by. It is sad but 8 of 10 persons have not even heard about any caves, tunnels and mines. I understand that young people are growing uneducated, but when 60-year-old uncle asks us to refer to the elderly, as he is still not old enough to remember this, it again brings sad thoughts. With some difficulty we managed to find a man who described how to get to one of the caves, at least.

We set out. It took few miles away and we appeared in the forest behind villas. We were passing 100 meters and the eye accidentally noticed flashed on the white snow black spot in the bushes. We came to and it was a horizontal entrance to the mine in the form of a "foxhole" described by a local resident.

A stone arch is overgrown with moss thickly. The ceiling is rugged, stony. Rotten leaves are at the entrance, a crumbling stone is a little further, and then, if you look closely, the pass abruptly goes to the right.

The spring, described above as the third, a little known tourist attraction is at 15 meters from the "manhole" in the mine. It is impossible to go on the road without noticing.

We meet cottagers, talk, and get only the azimuth and approximate distance to the next entrance of the adits. We are moving in this direction. A keen eye notices a narrow path, the contours of which are visible even under the snow. We turn aside. Find a column of foresters, indicating that we are in the right square, but not in the right "identification". We begin to scour the hillside. Incidentally, we notice a crumbling tree roots upwards in the water level, in the stream, in a deep gully. On the off-chance I come to view and discover a manhole near its roots, from which dampness and ghosts emanate.

I squeeze and notice that the hole leads into the "room" with the high ceiling. I take off the photographic equipment and climb further. A small "dressing room” with a metal lattice, partitioning off the entrance to the tunnel, is opened before eyes. Of course, there is not a lock, I touch the lattice and open the passage. Bent in half, but still moving on my feet, I go on. It is very humid. Water is dripping from the ceiling. The walls are dirty and wet. The "ceiling" becomes higher or makes me to bend more.

I'm moving illuminating the way with the flash of camera for the last ten meters. The series of "puffs", three steps, the series of "puffs", we move further.

Something squishes under feet. I’ve glanced; the water is almost covering shoes. "Gore-tex" does not stand up and gets wet. And I have to walk more cautiously. Look at the arch of the cave. How its color is clearly different from the color of the stone below. Judging by the descriptions, iron ore looks like this. I, of course, may be wrong.

The cave becomes wider and higher, water is a little less on the floor.

Walking a few dozens of meters, we face with the first trouble. The passage is sharply narrowing. Either walls have sprinkled or someone is digging something ahead.

The battery of the camera is discharging. By touch I am getting out a spare one, hoping in mind very much that it is charged. I have luck. A small speleological flashlight, which is always in a backpack, is not so effective, that I wonder. At night, it just "bombs" in a room. In a cave, full of water vapor, you cannot see anything more than 30-50 cm. Here is a narrow hole, very bad thoughts and feelings of anxiety are in my heart. It is real creepy in the complete absence of claustrophobia. A decision not to test fate more and not to take this cave unceremoniously was made. When I got out a white light, it seems a stone fells from the soul. Spring comes and I’ll go back to this object with a traditional company of like-minded people who like this kind of adventures. But then we’ll have radios, powerful flashlights, suitable waterproofed equipment and other necessary gadgets. That's when a sterling article exclusively about this cave will appear on this site.

Breathed fresh air, we moved to scour the slope. Exits of adits to the surface came across quite often. Besides, the whole surface of the mountain is in hoppers, troughs, covered with leaves and soil. There is a huge adit exit to the surface at the top of the hill. Leaves and snow thoroughly "cover" the entrance, however, a massive hollow is visible inside.

We are going down from the hills. I discover a man with a gun and a dog near the entrance to the cave in which we’ve just climbed. We greet, communicate and I begin to ask questions about other attractions. On the basis of answers I understand that this guy is very aware of these questions. And it has been my turn to surprise the interlocutor, as he surprised me with his knowledge 5 minutes ago. I say "judging by everything, apparently, you are a local forester, your name, in my opinion, is Shvenda, and your first name, I think, Michael (ua: Mykhaylo, ru: Mikhail), you live near the bus stop and the tractor T-40 is in the yard, if I am not mistaken "... Apparently, the forester was surprised very much. Admit that there is any kind of psychedelic in it. You are going with a gun in the forest, it is clean air, titmice are chirping, you meet some people in the wood, by appearance, they are urban, one of them, listened to you, suddenly says your name and your first name , where you live, even a model of tractor in the yard is identified. In general, the same day, the forester led us in the mountains and hollows of the village Hlyboke for a long time, for what we give him the separate, purely human thanks. You know, I’ve always wanted to walk in the forest accompanied by a man who would be a ranger, an ethnographer, and a hunter and an expert on the flora and fauna, in one person. On that day, I did it. But, all the time I was trying to appeal to the guide by the phrase "Dersu, show me the traces of Siberian tiger"...

Just we’ve moved on, I’ve decided to ask about the second object, the cave "Lylyki". Surprised, the forester: "And where have you just crawled out on all fours from?! This is the cave "Lylyki", dear"... "Was it that where the lattice was at the entrance”, I ask again. "That was", he replies. Here's how it was.

"Look, a wild goat has been here," says the forester. And indeed, traces of a roe hoofs are clearly seen in the fresh snow. "And recently", adds the guide. "And here, on this slope, right on the surface of the earth, large boulders of black granite are," he says in 100 meters, pointing on the slope of the mountain. We are wading through the thicket, and reach a cliff. "Here, more than ten years ago, an excavator uncovered a buried mine," says the guide, "and the powerful pressure of water was gushing from there, taken out an old rotten wheelbarrow and shovels." Then the cave was scouted, and eventually, the entrance was again sifted with slumping above soil and rotting leaves. "Don’t you want to look at what exits of adits badger families live", suddenly, the forester asks. "Of course", we cry with undisguised joy. It takes a kilometer of our way through deep snow between the hills and ravines, and we are near a cone-shaped hollow. Our guide is coming to the wall and begins to push toward the leaves. In a few seconds a manhole inside the rock is found. It is entered the smell of rotting leaves from the hole.

"Here, have a look what the male trampled on tracks away from the burrow when he was preparing it for winter". On that day, I was surprised to learn that badgers, like bears, hibernate, fattening thick fat reserves in winter. Moreover, the family lives in one burrow, and prepares another for the winter. They clean everything inside, pulling out "garbage" on the surface, necessarily pulling off it away from the entrance of the hole/cave. In the process of winding circles a badger "tramples" quite clearly marked small tracks. He has short legs, and that’s why you can often find fluff from its abdomen on these tracks.

It takes more hundred meters of our way and we are near a massive arch, the prveniant entrance to another adit/ cave. "Few years ago, its height was about 2-2,5 meters," says the forester, "Now, I see, everything is "covering" very quickly. We come to the next place and I see how our guide becomes disappointed. A tree appears before eyes, lying up the roots. “And it is lying right on that place where a huge entrance to the cave was”, says the forester. Look, only a small part of manhole is seen, and it is filled up.

That day we together with the guide visited a dozen of different objects in four hills in the 34th square. If there had been no snow we could even view the dumps of "rusty" iron rocks around several adits on the border of the 34th and 35th squares. But the visit of them is planed in the spring.

When we came back without uttering a single sound for few hours, a forester’s doggie shook off somewhere to the side, and ran a few hundred feet, fell to barking. "It has raised any animal", says the guide, "but the brave poor fellow would not be bitten".

Totally we walked about 10 kilometers for 4.5 hours. And we did all this at a high sticky snow, ravines and hills, fallen trees. Once more time we thank our guide. For that, he spent his time on us, and for his interesting stories. That day I learned many new things of the winter forest, unique trees, animal traces, caves and adits.

03.03.2011. 08:46

Simon on 03.03.2011. 11:56

I enjoed this, thank a lot. Very descriptive and nice pics.

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Articles and photos are copyrighted by Alex Bogdanov. All rights reserved. Please, do not republish (entirely or partially) without explicit permission.